Florentine Codex: Book 1: Book 1: The Gods

This volume presents a run down of the divine pantheon of the Mexica, presenting the gods, goddesses and minor divine figures, what was believed about them and how their idols were dressed and painted by their worshippers. Some entries provide more detail as to their function and how the Mexica carried out some rituals relating to specific gods, but not a full presentation of them. All fascinating, and sometimes terrifying, information. The only minor drawback to it is that, while the original artwork is reproduced, each picture of each god is not placed within the appropriate chapter. Instead, all pictures are collected together in the middle of the book. It doesn't distract from the reading or even deter one from buying the book, but I would have preferred the pictures to be in the original place.A small treat you get from reading the Codex as opposed to a scholarly work on the same subject is a glimpse into Nahuatl poetics. From what I understand, Sahagun transcribed the words of the indigenous people he interviewed. As such, much of the description they ended up providing I'd guess, since they had no writing, reflects their oratory art, wherein descriptions of their gods are layered on each other like pyramids. For example: "This Omacatl was a god of Uitznauac. To him were attributed, to him were ascribed--they said that his inventions were--banqueting, invitations to feasts, acceptance [of invitations], the feasting of people. His domain became the gathering, the assembling of relatives. To one's house was brought his image, there to be held in esteem and cared for." Each chapter describes their gods in such a manner, and Anderson and Dibble did such a beautiful job with the English.While the price is hefty, it's well worth it if you want source material on Mexica culture. Some things to consider, though, that I didn't realize. The text is organized in double-columns (the right side of the page containing the original Nahuatl and the left side containing an early modern English translation). Not to worry! This translation is done by the professors, as noted, just a few decades ago; they just simply decided perhaps to translate it literally. I don't know Nahuatl grammar, but my guess is that they have formal and informal second-person, which would explain the translation.Also, the notes that accompany the text are not translated. Whatever note Sahagun made in his own Spanish translation is reproduced as a footnote in Spanish. The same is said of the German notes done for the German translation made years and years ago. While I know Spanish, I don't know German and missed out.The last chapters of the book consist of Sahagun encouraging the natives, to put it lightly, to abandon idolatry. While his compassion was such that he let the natives speak for themselves and their own beliefs in their own language, he has some heavy things to say about their beliefs (which is understandable considering he was a missionary) and what he believes should be done to natives who persist (which would offend contemporary sensibilities).All in all, this book is wonderful!

Obviously one mustn't be too picky when choosing which bilingual volume of English-Nahuatl Florentine Codex to buy. The price is quite high, for the amount of book you're actually getting, especially when you realize that people like me will eventually want to buy the whole set. The pictures of the gods are not in-line with the text, but instead all put together in the middle (?) of the book. The paper quality of the picture pages is great, but the paper for the actual text seems cheap, like a novel. It's that kind of brownish, matte, coarse paper that paperback novels from the 90s are printed on. Also, for scholars or hobbyists of Nahuatl, it would be nice to have the original Nahuatl text transcribed in a consistent spelling (preferably standard classical orthography). However, having the original text transcribed verbatim, letter-per-letter is good enough. Each page has many many footnotes to the English translation, and a knowledge of French, German, and Spanish is required to read them. 5 Stars because the translation is lucid, and the overall production is great. Just feel like we're getting taken to the cleaners on the paper quality and price-per-page ratio.

A+ all the way!Thanks Again.

Absolutely awesome information regarding the other side of the story as it relates to the Spanish Conquest of New Spain. It is common knowledge that millions of natives died because of the Spanish invasion of their homeland, but not all due to "evil" Conquistadores. Cortez had no other choice but to stop the massive sacrificial madness, as well as the cannibalism associated with it. I believe that the victims of the sacrifices petitioned Cortez to do the right thing and stop the madness.I love these books, but the art work is out of this world!

From an informational standpoint, this book was great, but it could have been better. I personally dislike that the first 20 pages only have writing on one side of the page, and only about half of that is information on the gods themselves; the other half of the page is either left blank or filled with annotations referring to other texts.I was also disappointed that this book was so expensive; despite being only 84 pages long, it cost more than $25. However, it is still a good book.

I do not wish to undermine the overall historical value of this book, but I do believe the following information is critical to making a decision whether to buy it or not, especially if you are looking for costume and/or colour reference:Of the total 84 numbered pages, only 9 are of illustrations from the Codex.7 of these pages are in black and white, leaving only 2 in colour.The first page is almost entirely script, with a single 2.5 x 2'' illustration in the bottom corner.The following 5 black and white pages each show 4 illustrations of 4 x 2.75''.The last black and white page shows 8 densely packed images of varying sizes.The 2 colour pages show a total of 14 images, varying between 4 x 2.25'' to 2.1 x 1.25''. Ironically, 3 of these are basically monochrome.

Hecho con materiales de baja calidad

Yeah cool read. I can't wait to get Vol2.